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Britons are facing a cost-of-living crisis. With the annual rate of inflation running at 6.2 percent, a thirty-year high, nearly eight million adults are estimated to be behind on one or more household bill, with just over six million believed to have gone without energy, water, or electricity since the start of 2022, according to the Money Advice Trust. Consumers are being hit by all angles, with UK households potentially facing the biggest energy bill shock since the 1950s, and shop price inflation acce

Issue 118 of News on the Block has now been published and is available to read online. This issue includes our Unsung Heroes feature in association with Jackson Sims Recruitment. This issue includes some of the following articles:  Cladding concerns ‘raised years before Grenfell fire Without David, ARMA may not have existed at all! Tributes are paid to former ARMA CEO David Hewitt after his death 2020: A Defining Year in Modern History: Are developers now making well-being and health an integral pa

The entry deadine for this years awards has been extended until Friday 13th May 2022.  We are delighted to be welcoming you back for the ERMAs 2022 on 30 June 2022. The Enfranchisement & Right to Manage Awards, which is now in it's 13th year, celebrate excellence in the leasehold enfranchisement and right to manage industry. We have listened to your feedback from 2021 and introduced some new categories for 2022 which you can view here, as well as the all important judging criteria. Entries a

FirstPort, the UK residential property services company, today announces that it is being acquired by Emeria, the European leader in residential real estate services, from the company’s previous majority shareholder, the mid-market private equity investor Equistone Partners Europe Limited (“Equistone”). FirstPort will operate as a subsidiary of Emeria, with its existing management team remaining in place and reinvesting in the group. The financial terms of the deal are undisclosed and completion of the tr

The ValPal Network has called on agents to have the tools by which to react to and nurture leads outside of traditional office hours, as this is when most valuation requests are made.  The platform, which includes the award-winning instant valuation ValPal tool that successfully generates vendor and landlord leads for agents at all times of the day and night, has found that 07:00-07:59 is consistently the most popular hour for valuation requests – with over 20,000 coming in during this hour in January 202

Proud to say that Jackson Sims has hit a new milestone this week by placing their 600th property professional. The people at Jackson Sims are proving to be market leaders in residential property recruitment having successfully finished recruitment campaigns in build to rent, student accommodation and of course block management. In 2020 Jackson Sims launched a residential site staff contracting business which has only strengthened the brand and now boasts over 150 temporary workers. Please do not hesitate

Huge improvements can be made across both the sales and lettings process, if agents used only a fraction of the wide range of property data available to them from Information Works.  Property-specific information is becoming even more important to the industry as both a targeting tool to assist in the acquisition of new customers and as a source of knowledge soon to be required throughout the sales and lettings process.  A recent announcement by National Trading Standards confirmed all property listings w

While the latest HM Registry UK House Price Index data revealed that the average price paid for a flat in the UK had increased by 5.1% year-on-year to January 2022, analysis by specialist block of flats insurance company Lansdown Insurance Brokers has found that at the top end of the market sales of £1million+ flats dropped by almost a third last year. The analysis showed that 2,639 £1million+ flats were sold in the UK in 2021 compared to 3,569 in 2020, a 30% drop. This follows similar year-on-year drops

Just over two years since  it started, the moratorium on landlord remedies to effect CRAR (commercial rent arrears recovery) and forfeiture of lease has ended with effect from 25th March 2022. This will undoubtedly come as a relief to many landlords who have tenants in arrears or need to retake possession of their property. However, the Commercial Rent (Coronavirus) Act, which came into force on 24th March 2022, will have an impact on both CRAR and forfeiture, should the rent arrears come under the criter

Principle Estate Management has won a prestigious new contract to look after 48 apartments near to a famous street in the East End of London. The appointment to manage Portrait Place, located just off Brick Lane, followed a full tender and resident consultation process. Brick Lane is located in the borough of Tower Hamlets, running south from Swanfield Street in Bethnal Green through Shoreditch and ending in Whitechapel. The Portrait Place development is on Bacon Lane, near to the junction with Brick Lane

Since 2014, Feefo has recognised businesses who deliver exceptional experiences. The Trusted Service Awards are unique as they are based purely on feedback from real customers. This means they are a true reflection of commitment to outstanding customer service. Feefo have given Platinum Trusted Service awards to businesses who have achieved Gold standard for three consecutive years. To receive a Gold Trusted Service award, businesses must have collected at least 50 reviews with a Feefo service rating of b

A property manager is expected to be multi-talented and knowledgeable across a huge spectrum of disciplines. They need to know where to turn and to whom to turn as issues fly in. The building surveyor is always going to be one of the most important partners. As a contractor myself who joined forces with an established building surveying practice, I now enjoy the best of both worlds.  As a supplier looking from outside in, there is a lot of reactive maintenance and not enough ‘proactive’, and given the acc